WarpedOne

It is not hard to understand that. It is also not hard to accept that Martin possibly made some bad moves. It is bussines, it is life.

What bothers me is this pretending that nothing had happended. Just like Martin was yet another guy who cleaned the toilletes last week.

I repeat: Martin created the company. He created it's image and became the face of the company. The fact he got fired over night without further notice I can only decode as:

What Martin was talking about and the image he represented in public no longer identifies with Tesla Motors and the future it wants to pursue. We are not what he talked about any more. He became an obstacle to our future steps.

And this bothers me very much.

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Michael

I'm surprised that Elon would say that there just didn't seem to be an obvious role for Martin. I guess I had the mistaken impression that Tesla was looking to hire people with technical/engineering expertise and that if they were motivated to have the same goals as Tesla then that would be a good thing. Oh well, I wonder what types of folks Tesla is actually looking to hire.

donauker

I totally agree with this. But I also see another possibility.

Martin was Tesla Motors and Tesla Motors / Martin Eberhard have been a media darling for quite some time. They are rightly credited with many things. Doing what many car manufactures would have said couldn’t be done, by creating a beautiful and desirable electric car in a few years. Forcing GM to do something never before seen in a major car manufacturer, emulating Tesla Motors by developing an electric car in a very open fashion with regular updates provided to Internet blogs.

The media spotlight has been focused on Martin for quite a while and there are some people that don’t handle it too well if they don’t get the credit that they feel they paid for. In many of the Elon Musk interviews I read, he always seemed to try to point out his significant role in the development process. This same tone is apparent in some of his justification of things that happened at Paypal and it would appear that some of the original founders there were marginalized also.

This is just an opinion and I guess each person has there own, but when X-CEOsWife alluded to egos as a possible problem it just strengthened my opinion.

Yanquetino

My interpretation might be off-base, but my brows knit when I read Musk's comment about the two-speed transmission. He stated that Edison Motors "picked the wrong supplier, not once but twice, and now we’re on to our third." According to Martin's presentation on August 7 to the Motor Press Guild, the second transmission was meeting expectations. Well... evidently not Musk's expectations. And whom do you think he is blaming for that?

The irony is that, unless I'm mistaken, Martin was content to go with a single-speed powertrain to begin with. Neither did he have an objection to off-the-shelf headlights and higher doorsills. Those were all the demands of Musk. Yet Martin gets "spanked" for the delays those changes put into the production process...?! (Funny thing is, as a consumer, I don't give an at's rass about standard headlights and higher doorsills --and actually prefer a single-speed powertrain, a la EV1.)

Musk also stated: ""There wasn’t an obvious role for Martin." Oh, yeah? It sure seems obvious to public perception --which evidently doesn't matter to him. As for his assertion that "if the board thought if it would be better for him to stay he would still be there," I can only laugh and shake my head. All of us who have to deal with managers in the workplace know very well how these feudal kingdoms work. I guess from now on I will have to also start calling that so-called board the Edison Motors' politburo.

vfx

So this thread has developed into:

Elon wants all the credit. He does not want to be only the guy smart enough and rich enough to support Martin's vision but the guy with the vision to make an electric car.

Elon want to be the new (successful) "Tucker" or "Delorean”.

That makes Martin the new "Man outta time". (look it up)

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TEG

vfx

With two blogs three days apart, Daryl sure is dangling those shiney keys.

http://www.teslamotors.com/blog3/?p=69 (Dec 3rd)
http://www.teslamotors.com/blog3/?p=70 (Dec 6th)

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The world loves to be deceived.

TEG

http://venturebeat.com/2007/12/05/bad-blood-at-tesla/
http://www.greentechmedia.com/articl...usted-351.html
http://www.edmunds.com/insideline/do...ticleId=123809
http://greenwombat.blogs.fortune.cnn...ounder-ousted/

TEG

http://www.glgroup.com/News/Is-it-po...-la-19813.html
http://www.glgroup.com/News/What-has...war-19812.html

Cobos

TEG have you read the last 2 posts from the Glgroup.... seems like pretty poor advice to me, as they still think Tesla is having problems with their battery.
Seems to me like he's just saying some general thoughts around how difficult it is to make a ICE car for a new company and not taking the genuinely new technology in the Tesla into account. Even I can see that and I'm not even an engineer.

Cobos